What should the Miami Dolphins do if Tua Tagovailoa stinks in 2021?

Miami Dolphins starting quarterback Tua Tagovailoa has dominated the offseason headlines, for better or worse.

You can’t go on social media without seeing a debate regarding Tagovailoa or someone just mentioning his name. In all my years of covering the NFL, I have truly never seen anything like it.

Tagovailoa, who has only started nine games in his career, has been under a microscope as we head into the 2021 season. In his nine games, Tagovailoa went 6-3 as a starter and threw for 1,814 yards. He also added 11 passing touchdowns and five interceptions. Tagovailoa completed 64.1% of his passes too.

Those numbers aren’t wild, but what those numbers have done is led to wild debates all offseason. Some media members and fans feel that Tagovailoa showed that he can’t be the guy for Miami. However, they are using that small sample size to determine that the Dolphins need a new quarterback.

It is also worth noting that those media members and fans are aware that Tagovailoa spent the entire 2020 offseason recovering from a gruesome hip injury while dealing with the COVID-19 offseason that was hard on everyone.

It is insane that so many people have formed negative, concrete answers about a young quarterback in the NFL after such a small sample size. On the other side, “Tua Stans,” which currently outnumber the “Tua Haters,” have been extremely outspoken as well. Tagovailoa did not play well enough or show enough for Tua Stans to act as if he’s a future All-Pro quarterback.

Yes, he had a lot against him, but those excuses are part of the evaluation, and right now, Tagovailoa needs to improve. I had a Tua Stan tell me he’d keep Tagovailoa over Patrick Mahomes, just to highlight how wild that side of the discussion has become too.

I sit somewhere in the middle, which is why social media is not always fun for me. I get called a “Tua Hater” and a “Tua Stan” all the time, and it’s exhausting defending myself as someone who truly sits in the middle.

I think Tagovailoa has the potential to be really good, but I also am a little worried that he won’t reach that potential. With that in mind, I tweeted a question that got hundred of fascinating replies.

Here is the tweet:

I won’t cover all of them, but I think it’s worth going over all of the popular answers/scenarios. So, with that in mind, let’s talk about what the Miami Dolphins would do if Tua Tagovailoa stinks in 2021.